The right to assemble and protest is enshrined in American law, but it can still be dangerous to hit the streets to make your voice heard. Your devices are a treasure trove of information about you, and you may not always know who’s collecting that data. Take a few minutes before you go to assess your digital and physical safety. Even if you have nothing to hide, you don’t want to accidentally give law enforcement officials any information you didn’t intend to share. Follow these tips to lock down your phone before a protest or other peaceful assembly.
IMO just having your personal device on you in the presence of a protest puts you in danger. They have ample tools to track cellular devices that basically cannot be guarded against without disabling the function altogether, such as with a Faraday bag. They will catch and log that you were at a protest, and use that against you later.
Don’t bring your phone period. Any and all devices can be broken into by law enforcement. Buy a burner with cash if you need some kind of communication.
Its not the device cracking that’s the problem; its the “your device was identified at the protest we have labeled a riot and has been tracked to your home, which we will now raid in the middle of the night”.
Has this regime already done this or are you just saying what the next steps might be if nothing changes?
For the “already done this”:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COINTELPRO
For the modern technology making it significantly easier:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IMSI-catcher
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stingray_phone_tracker
TL:DR, if you’re at a protest and your signal drops to 2G, your device is being monitored and tracked. Whether or not anyone acts on that data is a whole other thing.
And bring a separate video camera
No, , this isn’t the 90s. You want a many copies as possible immediately, later might not happen.
Yes a burner that you don’t activate. Keep it in a faraday bag. In an emergency you can take it out and call 911.
Yep, ding ding ding, buy a burner phone, with cash, from a store that doesn’t have many or very good cameras.
Bringing your real main phone is you thinking you know more about cybersecurity and surveillance than Palantir, than all the cybersec and intel firms the US Mil and Police departments have been partnering with with over a decade now.
99.99999999% chance you don’t.
This might be relevant for following ICE around or direct action, but at this point there’s almost zero personal risk from attending something like a rally or a march.
My relatives and even friends my age are afraid to go to protests. They read stuff like this, and it acts as demobilization messaging. In my experience, once you get them to go once they’re no longer afraid to engage, but there’s an initial fear and anticipatory obedience that has to be overcome.
inb4 protests do nothing: getting people to stick their toe in the water helps build commitment that will one day be necessary to gain critical mass for more organized disobedience.
ICE has literally started going door to door in Minnesota looking for immigrants and activists. It’s already starting, people need to be protecting their privacy now.
This might be relevant for following ICE around or direct action, but at this point there’s almost zero personal risk from attending something like a rally or a march.
No. If the data exists at any point, then a future threat will be able to exploit it, so full on nazi style fascism might not be here yet, but when it is, you’ll be in danger. Data can sleep forever before it becomes a threat.
It already is, with taking a digital device!
Going to a Protest? Don’t Bring Your Phone
FTFY
Someone’s gotta record the fascism.
cameras exist.
Camera’s can be easily confiscated and broken by fascists.
Instant uploads are much harder to suppress.
no bigger than a phone, no harder to destroy than a phone. just as easy to conceal as a phone.
SD cards are pretty resilient.
Then use… a camera??
Pretty easy to take video on an old phone without a SIM, or with a cheapo burner sim.
Are there “burner sims” you can get nowadays that don’t require online activation (i.e. they can easily trace the sim back to you)?
Phreeli, if you pay using crypto that can keep you anonymous
Or Saily, or anything in Europe, just buy with cash etc. probably also doable with Walmart SIMs in us…
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Also calling help if/when they shoot you might be helpful.
If it makes you feel better, go nuts.
But they have Face ID, gait ID, they have the signal from your cellular-equipped car, on and on. Even if your phone is “off” it’s transmitting an ID for antitheft purposes. Your smartwatch is leaking your location, and your smart tags.
Leave the car at home? They can track your public transit card via the credit card you used to fill it.
Stay home and post online? Palantir has Reddit posts from deleted accounts they will dig up to torpedo your future political ambitions as they did with Graham Platner.
We are all on the regime’s naughty list. Might as well make the most of it and demonstrate peacefully. And without a mask so you don’t look like an agent provocateur.
It’s Spartacus time.
there are less antagonistic looking ways to mask yourself, such as cute inflatable animal suits.
100%. Love the frog suits.
Good look running when you need to in that, the way it’s looking lately, the need will be there.
Even if your phone is “off” it’s transmitting an ID for antitheft purposes.
Faraday bags!
I bring my phone, and my wallet, and my keys, and a $7,000 camera, and my lawyer’s phone number in my head.
they can suck my balls
always film cops
Shut off and leave your phone at home, buy a pay-as-you-go to bring with you for emergency contact/coordination
Shut off and leave your phone at home, buy a pay-as-you-go to bring with you for emergency contact
/coordinationLeave the pay-as-you-go phone powered off too, and only power it up if you actually have to use it. If you have to use it once, you need to get a replacement for a future event.
I’m thinking perhaps something like Meshtastic transmitters and receivers should be used for coordination instead.
Meshtastic is exactly what needs to be implemented
I ran across that instance the other day and immediately thought about coordination.
It’s like sneaker net for piracy.
Fuck yeah, hack the planet
Meshtastic is just as susceptible to listening and isn’t perfect at encryption or anonymity but should be another tool to consider when cellphone towers are down or otherwise unusable.
It’s alright for non-critical stuff. Ok for getting help, not the best for coordinating action.
Reticulum is an alternative network/protocol that focuses more on security and interconnection of different networks
leave your primary phone ON at home.
I believe there are Bluetooth network protocols that mesh that would work for messaging and not require cell service. It would be smart to organize using something like that and just use any cell phone without cell service turned on. That still gives you the ability to call 911 in case of emergencies as well.
Cell service is always turned on on a phone, even with no SIM card and the phone in airplane mode, and for most phones, even when the phone is “off”. They still ping the local towers semi regularly; they just don’t ramp up transmission power ir try to establish a full connection.
Anyone got a list of Bluetooth devices without a cell antenna where the BT MAC is regularly scrambled?
Does it matter if that cell service isn’t connected to a name?
No, because it will spend most of its time after leaving the store in your home.
First, don’t buy it from a store. Second, turn that sucker off before you go home.
You can use Briar, BitChat, or Bridgefy to communicate, without having internet connections. I’ve only tried Briar, which works with cell networks, wifi, also bluetooth.
Right? It’s like these guys have never seen The Wire.
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- Get a cheap mobile specifically for protests, especially using it for pictures and video.
- Set it up to livestream everything, so that any video evidence gained can’t be taken away.
- Get a faraday bag for when you need to put that mobile away and not be tracked.
Maybe I’m missing something though?
I got a body cam for about $50 amazon dot com/dp/B0BHZ4PRRG, currently unavailable. Makes a great dashcam too. When the usb charging cable is plugged in it turns on when you start your car and turns off when you turn off your car.
The only thing you’re missing is to put a piece of white tape on the sole of your shoe. When you are lying on the ground It’s a cop signal that you are an undercover agent.
I would like to bring the attention to LoRa.
Meshtastic is a good example of leveraging LoRa.
I really really hope that this takes off.
You wanted to bring attention to it but you couldn’t bother to say what it is?
Haven’t used my client in almost a year, but my repeater is still running strong.
Cripes all of that and not even, “Buy a burner SIM card”, “Use a VPN at all time if you have to use data”, “For the love of god don’t use biometrics as authorization, use a alphanumeric password to unlock”, “Use the damn encryption solution provided by your phone’s OS”.
Burner sim won’t help, you need a burner phone too.
A VPN does not stop location data for your physical device when looking at cellular data from the carrier. Your location can and is always triangulated using cell towers. VPNs only ever protect your IP address from being geolocated and encrypting the data downloaded and uploaded while connected. Bit streams are still sent and received from a physical place in the world before the VPN hides your traffic and that is recorded by the cell provider.
What’s the plan for having your phone at home? They’re going door to door and shooting innocent white American citizens.
What’s the plan for having your phone at home?
#00 inserts for my pump action wireless hole punch.
Lol, lmao even. That’s some careful word play for the sake of unneccesary hyperbole.
They have shot innocent white American citizens. In some other places they have gone door to door. Those are independent actions, not a combined reality. We can all agree they’re god awful as a massive understatement without lying about door to door murder squads.
Inb4 “if you have to make that kind of distinction you’re already fucked” yeah, we are, but accurate information about the ground situation is vital for any forward movement.
Man, that’s a Reddit-pedantic “you forgot PEDMAS” -like response to someone worrying about getting their home raided and asking a simple question.
You’re not fucked. You’re a dick. And being one isn’t “vital” to anything.
You can’t seriously be suggesting that lying to people about the sitaution is in any way helpful.
Fuck off and sow FUD elsewhere.
You can’t be so dense as to think that simple minded hair splitting is actually useful when people are being dragged from their homes at gunpoint by the US Gestapo right now?
Holy shit.
You might as well be a Fed.
You can buy faraday wallets for like $20.
Would an old school walkie talkie be a better solution? You want to be able to communicate within a group in case shit happen
That depends what you’re trying to solve. For a lot of people, they’re still gonna need their phone. I don’t think “Just use a walkie talkie bro” would read as very helpful advice to the average person.
If, however, you are the sort of person organizing a protest or other similar activity, yes, absolutely, walkie tallies are great. A lot of people who do serious political activism talk about how radio is still the most resilient communication method. Not fool-proof, you definitely need to study up on the limitations, but an invaluable tool to be aware of.
If you are going to a protest as a group, and you have the resources to invest a few hundred bucks, getting a set of walkie-talkies for the group plus a dedicated burner one responsible person to carry (maybe someone who will be in radio range but clear of the actual happenings) is also a solid strategy, but we also shouldn’t be acting like “Going as a group” and “spending a few hundred dollars” are prerequisites for being politically active. There need to be solutions for everyone.
I think FRS is the only thing legally available without a license. You can buy GMRS radios on Amazon that will communicate with FRS radios on all of the FRS channels, see here:
https://wiki.radioreference.com/index.php/FRS/GMRS_combined_channel_chart
However, these radios are VERY limited in an urban area with lots of concrete towers. In my experience the GMRS radios on “high power” really only go one little valley over out in the woods. In the city you might get two or three blocks because of all the concrete. You are required to have a license to use GMRS and identify your station every 15 minutes but almost nobody does it. Hell, I listen to the local walmart using GMRS and you’re not even supposed to use it for commercial purposes.
Maybe Meshtastic? That’s a radio I haven’t messed with and I don’t know about it’s performance in an urban environment.
Ear piece highly recommended. The audio is not like a phone call and in a loud environment you will not be able to copy. Practice beforehand because radio is not like a phone call, you need to have some experience.
Yes. You can get them cheap online and they have a built in “encryption” function that isn’t well protected but might prevent people from listening in realtime.
They are not actually encrypted (anything like that on the box is basically a lie). Just pre-arrange code words for emergencies and use a “handle” instead of a name. Old school works.
These articles mean nothing. You have 2 options.
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Leave ALL electronics at home and do not bring anything to the protest that connects to a tower or the internet.
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Just deal with the fact you are being tracked and deal with it.
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Cant u just use encrypted messaging services like whatsapp signal telegram? SMS isn’t encrypted. And this is also why you shouldn’t give tech billionaire companies so much power as a nation lol they abuse ur privacy thats why I love how EU is still trying to protect our rights at least
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Whatsapp and Signal are US-based, which means that they will give up your data on the first request.
This is true. In regards to Signal, they do always comply with the governments request for data. The things is, Signal has next to no data on you. So when they comply, they give them everything they have (which is next to nothing). You can see everything they have given up here: https://signal.org/bigbrother/
You can turn secret chats on on telegram that do use encryption, I thought?
I like fluffycat :3
edit: (its just matrix)
